


Rubatosis

by sdd_writes_things



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Mentions of Simon, Mentions of Suicide, TW: Suicide, connor starts to really feel emotions and he decides he really doesnt like it, dbh spoilers, i guess, suicide warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-04
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-06-05 06:19:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15164507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sdd_writes_things/pseuds/sdd_writes_things
Summary: Rubatosis: (n) The unsettling awareness of your own heartbeat.After being faced with what it means exactly to fear death, Connor suddenly finds himself excruciatingly conscious of the fragility of his own life.





	Rubatosis

**Author's Note:**

> last chance theres mentions of suicide if thats bad for you dont read this

The ride back to the station was unpleasantly quiet. It was a porcelain silence, the fragility of the air between Connor and Hank becoming increasingly distinct with every snowflake that fell from the sky and hit the windshield.

Connor held his hand over the gun wound in his arm. It didn't hurt, of course, but the thirium leaking between his fingers was a blaring reminder of what had just transpired on the roof.

He could feel the lieutenant's gaze on him, careful, calculating. It made him distinctly aware of the faint trembling in his limbs.

Connor was confused. He'd known his program was beginning to stray farther from its goal for a while now, due to a number of occurrences, but this...

This wasn't supposed to happen.

He wasn't supposed to feel so out of place, so lost. He wasn't supposed to feel tears pricking at his eyes and he wasn't supposed to shake when confronted with something traumatizing, if at all. He wasn't supposed to be so intensely conscious of his frantic heartbeat in the wake of his hologram death.

He pulled his other arm around himself. Somehow it offered a sense of comfort.

The word "Jericho" bounced around his head ceaselessly, like a game of pinball. Connor imagined that one cryptic clue as a pinball itself and imagined Hank, a little tipsy, knocking it against all the little bumpers in the pinball machine at Jimmy's, grumbling threats and curses every time it didn't do what he wanted. He closed his eyes. The image seemed to drown out the heaviness and the pain--this deep, uncomfortable feeling in his chest and gut--that came with that damned word.

Jericho, Jericho. What did that even _mean_? Was it a place? Was it a person? Connor didn't know. For once, he almost didn't care, either. He only cared about finding out why he was _feeling_. Why he wanted to throw up even though he knew he couldn't.

Connecting to a deviant must've planted a bug in his system, he tried to convince himself. It must have deleted a line of code.

He told himself these things. It did nothing to help and he knew they were lies.

The feeling of dying was all too real to convince himself it was fake.

It was an awful sensation. He could feel the fear and the anger of the deviant, he could feel the bullet pierce through his chin and escape through his skull. And it hurt. There was pain, real pain, that Connor didn't understand. And he was scared because the deviant was scared, he was scared because it felt like it was happening to him and he couldn't comprehend it. Nothing in his programming had prepared him for that, nothing he'd ever been told could help him recognize pain and fear and then react accordingly.

It was a vague feeling of fear and confusion and sickness that overtook him now. He didn't want to be labeled a deviant and yet here he was, emotions churning in his core where there once was peace.

Peace, and nothing.

A mechanical Garden of Eden where everything flourished but was never alive. And now it was as if he'd eaten from that wretched fruit, this apple that embodied death, and now he could feel everything and nothing at once, and he wanted, pathetically, to curl into a ball and cry.

He wouldn't. But he could.

He didn't want to be alive. He didn't want to die, now, either.

The firm pressure of a hand on his shoulder shook him from his misery and he opened his eyes. Hank had pulled the car to a stop on the side of the road and was giving Connor a vaguely concerned look, as opposed to his usual annoyance toward his android colleague.

"Checking in with Cyber Life again?" the lieutenant asked.

Connor knew that Hank knew that wasn't the case. It would be no use lying to him.

"No."

"You...doin' alright, son? You haven't said anything since we left the scene."

Connor's chest felt tight. This was so foreign, so uncomfortable, and he hated himself for allowing this to happen. He'd never really _felt_ before. He didn't know why he was now.

And while he was equipped with the ability to cry, he certainly wasn't about to. Not now. Not in front of Hank.

Not with Amanda there, watching from the inside.

Connor watched Hank for a long time. "I'm...no," he answered. His throat was tighter than it had been. "I don't know what's happening. I...I'm confused, and..."

Hank stared at him a moment. "Shit, kid," he muttered. "It's a shame you can't drink 'cause otherwise I'd buy you a beer." He started the car again and pulled back onto the road. He was quiet for a while longer before tightening his grip on the wheel. "Death's a heavy thing. Most people are scared of it."

Connor looked at him and he glanced back.

"I guess that means androids too. Luckily they can bring you back." Hank shrugged. "Doesn't mean it won't do things to you, though."


End file.
